SET: DOING HER BIT, young girl as nurse

OILETTE, PRINTED IN ENGLAND or PRINTED IN THE UNITED KINGDOM, COPYRIGHT LONDON
PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING LETTER ABOUT THIS SET OF POSTCARDS-with grateful acknowledgement to Tim Sands (grandson of Ada Florence Tuplin and son of Mary Elfreda Sands), 23 Sudbrooke Road, Scothern, Lincolnshire’.
Doing Her Bit Postcards
Raphael Tuck & Sons, published the group of postcards, Oilette Postcard No 8887, called, Doing Her Bit, during the First World War. The original photographs for these cards were taken in 1915 in Sheffield
using young members of the ‘Tuplin’ family in the role of the Red Cross Nurse and, in one card, a Doctor
caring for their ‘doll’ patients.
It is unclear how the contact was made between the ‘Tuplins’ and Raphael Tuck. However, perhaps
unusually for the time, the children’s mother, Ada Florence Tuplin (nee Simms) (1873-1948), was an
enthusiastic photographer, taking and developing photographs of family events as well as more creative
tableaux; one of the latter depicts a woodland scene with her daughter, basket in hand, dressed up as
Little Red Riding Hood. She was, for example, a contributor to The New Photographer magazine. It may
be that Raphael Tuck used a professional photographer (in Sheffield?) who was acquainted with the
family.
The Red Cross Nurse in the pictures is Mary Elfreda Tuplin (known as Freda) (1912-1989), aged 3½, and
the doctor is her brother, Frederick Roy Tuplin (1903-1976), aged 12. One of the dolls in the pictures was
named ‘Belinda’ by Freda and is by Simon Halbig and made for Kammer & Reinhardt. Ironically, in view
of the time, it is a high quality German doll and may well have been a gift from Raphael Tuck.
Ada Florence Tuplin was my grandmother and Mary Elfreda Tuplin my mother.
Tim Sands
08/07/20